Skip to main content

The Name on the Dotted Line

PetitionsThis is posted on the White House’s We the People website, which allows we the people to create polls and collect signatures to show support or opposition to various things involving the federal government:

This petition is a response to the "End taxpayer subsidies for new nuclear reactors" petition.

Due to the manufactured controversy that is the nuclear reactor meltdown in Fukushima, Japan, perpetuated by a scientifically illiterate news media, the public is unnecessarily hostile to nuclear power as an energy source.

To date nobody has died from the accident and Fukushima, and nuclear power has the lowest per Terra-watt hour death toll of any energy source known to man:

http://nextbigfuture.com/2011/03/deaths-per-twh-by-energy-source.html

The Obama administration should take better strides to educate the public regarding this important energy source.

I’m not sure I agree with the much of the language here or even agree that the Obama administration has done a crummy job making the point that nuclear energy is key to the U.S. energy future. Poll numbers on nuclear energy took a hit after the Fukushima accident, certainly, but have largely recovered.

But that’s not the point, is it? You can decide for yourself if you think the petition is worth your signature. After all, if you want to create an alternate petition for others to sign, you can. 

You have to sign up for a free account on the site to sign the petition – and any number of others that are there – or create your own. The Next Big Future site describes itself as covering “science and technology having high potential for disruption and analysis of plans, policies and technology to enable radical improvements.” I assume it means radical improvements to our lives – in any event, a review of its posts show that it isn’t hauling a lot of ideological freight and covers a large number of topics.

As the poll description above indicates, the site is pugnaciously in favor of nuclear energy and participates in the Carnival of Nuclear Energy NNN hosted this week. Other than that, NEI has no affiliation with The Next Big Future, though it’s always nice to spotlight one of our blog roll friends.

If you want to know about the poll to which this one is a response, well, you’re on your own, buster.

The picture comes from a Rolling Thunder Down Home Democracy Tour event in North Carolina. I have no brief on the group – nice photo, though.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Does NEI believe that the Fukushima nuclear accident is a "manufactured controversy"?

Popular posts from this blog

An Ohio School Board Is Working to Save Nuclear Plants

Ohio faces a decision soon about its two nuclear reactors, Davis-Besse and Perry, and on Wednesday, neighbors of one of those plants issued a cry for help. The reactors’ problem is that the price of electricity they sell on the high-voltage grid is depressed, mostly because of a surplus of natural gas. And the reactors do not get any revenue for the other benefits they provide. Some of those benefits are regional – emissions-free electricity, reliability with months of fuel on-site, and diversity in case of problems or price spikes with gas or coal, state and federal payroll taxes, and national economic stimulus as the plants buy fuel, supplies and services. Some of the benefits are highly localized, including employment and property taxes. One locality is already feeling the pinch: Oak Harbor on Lake Erie, home to Davis-Besse. The town has a middle school in a building that is 106 years old, and an elementary school from the 1950s, and on May 2 was scheduled to have a referendu

Why Ex-Im Bank Board Nominations Will Turn the Page on a Dysfunctional Chapter in Washington

In our present era of political discord, could Washington agree to support an agency that creates thousands of American jobs by enabling U.S. companies of all sizes to compete in foreign markets? What if that agency generated nearly billions of dollars more in revenue than the cost of its operations and returned that money – $7 billion over the past two decades – to U.S. taxpayers? In fact, that agency, the Export-Import Bank of the United States (Ex-Im Bank), was reauthorized by a large majority of Congress in 2015. To be sure, the matter was not without controversy. A bipartisan House coalition resorted to a rarely-used parliamentary maneuver in order to force a vote. But when Congress voted, Ex-Im Bank won a supermajority in the House and a large majority in the Senate. For almost two years, however, Ex-Im Bank has been unable to function fully because a single Senate committee chairman prevented the confirmation of nominees to its Board of Directors. Without a quorum

NEI Praises Connecticut Action in Support of Nuclear Energy

Earlier this week, Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy signed SB-1501 into law, legislation that puts nuclear energy on an equal footing with other non-emitting sources of energy in the state’s electricity marketplace. “Gov. Malloy and the state legislature deserve praise for their decision to support Dominion’s Millstone Power Station and the 1,500 Connecticut residents who work there," said NEI President and CEO Maria Korsnick. "By opening the door to Millstone having equal access to auctions open to other non-emitting sources of electricity, the state will help preserve $1.5 billion in economic activity, grid resiliency and reliability, and clean air that all residents of the state can enjoy," Korsnick said. Millstone Power Station Korsnick continued, "Connecticut is the third state to re-balance its electricity marketplace, joining New York and Illinois, which took their own legislative paths to preserving nuclear power plants in 2016. Now attention should